Newsletter

Echo Ridge: Topeka's green community

Site selection and orientation of the homes at the new Echo Ridge community in southeast Topeka allows for the greatest possible passive solar heating and cooling benefits. All duplexes feature Energy Star high-emissive roofing.

The Topeka Housing Authority's 66-unit Echo Ridge community cost $13.5 million and features many sustainable amenities, such as low -flow water fixtures, ground source heating and cooling, and rainwater conservation.

Echo Ridge has 33 duplexes, built with 25 percent sustainable wood and 5 percent recycled materials. Rainwater is captured to water trees and each unit has a raised garden.

The community center has a teaching kitchen, meeting rooms and an attached play area.

The four unit complex on the west side of Echo Ridge is unlike the other units in the complex. It has planted roofs and nut tress, berry bushes.

The balcony ofthe complex overlooks the community center and has a planted roof.

Permeable sidewalks are utilized throughout Echo Ridge. Rain water seeps through the sidewalks and stays on site.

Take a drive down California street near the S.E. 2000 block and look to the east, and you will see a building that looks like it came off the set of a futuristic movie.

It's Echo Ridge, or at least one of the apartment buildings associated with the Topeka Housing Authority’s newest housing development. Echo Ridge is a 66-unit green community.

“In June 2009, HUD issued a request for proposals for people interested in creating green communities,” John Johnston, president of the Topeka Housing Authority, said. “We had, I think, four weeks to get the package put together.

“Three weeks later, I received an email stating that we had been awarded $10 million. We put that with $3.5 million in tax credits and local investments for the $13.5 million project.”

“There's berry bushes out there, hardwoods, every kind of nut tree,” Johnston said. “It has surface water management — permeable concrete so the water doesn't run off, it stays on site.”

In addition, each home has a rain barrel to collect the rainwater coming off the roof. The water is then used for trees and plants, including the home’s raised garden area.

Other features include reflective roofs, ground-source heating and cooling, super-insulated walls and roofs, and low-flow water and energy star appliances. More then 25 percent of all the wood products used are certified sustainable, and 5 percent of all materials are recycled.

Two 300-foot-deep well fields supply the entire complex with 58-degree water that is used to cool each house in the summer and heat it in the winter.

The units have R-49 insulation in the attic, three layers of insulation in the walls — cellulose, fiber board and the siding — and triple-glazed windows.

“The utility bills are going to be about zip,” Johnston said.

Within the complex there is a community center with a planted roof, passive solar features, photo-voltaic lighting, a teaching kitchen, a play area and meeting rooms.

“In fifteen years, most of the things you see built into this housing complex will be standard in new housing complexes,” Johnston said.

“There's nothing like this anywhere,” he added. “The closest one is in Denver, Colorado. I'm not sure, but I think this is the first one finished.”